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Tahm Kench/Development
Champion Reveal: Tahm Kench, the River King is a tough solo lane or support tank with a for... well, pretty much everything. He'll happily down on an enemy champion once he's them up, stowing them in his sizeable belly - and out of a fight - while the River King's allies leverage their advantage. But Tahm Kench's stomach isn't reserved solely for his enemies: after an ally, the tanky fish-man can dive into one of his signature whirlpools before throwing himself towards the enemy team. Champion Reveal: Tahm Kench, the River King ;Abilities I= ;An Acquired Taste Tahm Kench applies a stack of An Acquired Taste to all enemy champions he hits with basic attacks or damaging abilities. Once he's applied three stacks, he can interact with them... differently. |-|Q= ;Tongue Lash Tahm Kench himself briefly while launching his tongue in a target direction. Tongue Lash stops once it hits a target, damaging and whatever he hits. If Tahm Kench slathers an enemy champion with three stacks of then hits them with Tongue Lash, he them instead. |-|W= ;Devour Tahm Kench briefly swallows a nearby targeted unit. Enemies suffer as . In addition: * Once Tahm Kench Devours an enemy minion or monster, he can the ability to spit them out in a target direction. They deal damage to whoever they hit. * When Tahm Kench devours an allied champion, he renders his ally immune from damage and gains extra movement speed when he heads toward enemy champions. Both Tahm Kench and his edible ally can choose when the latter leaves. * Tahm Kench can only Devour enemy champions once he's applied three stacks of to them. His movement speed is drastically reduced while enemy champs - who suffer and can only see things immediately around the River King - are in his belly. |-|E= ;Thick Skin * All damage Tahm Kench takes is turned into grey health. Once he leaves combat, the grey health falls off, healing him for a portion of the amount of grey health he's earned. * Tahm Kench converts his grey health into a shield that quickly falls off. |-|R= ;Abyssal Voyage * All of Tahm Kench's damage scales with . * Tahm Kench opens his maw, offering an ally a spot inside his belly. Once they jump in, or once Tahm Kench decides he's diving solo, he starts channeling, conjuring a whirlpool beneath him before diving in, reappearing a few seconds later at his target location. Abyssal Voyage has a huge range, but the ability is pretty well telegraphed by its lengthy cast. ;Support Tahm Kench makes for a fine support thanks to his unrivalled ability to his marksman from otherwise impending death. Once he's wobbled into lane, his main role is to stick with his lane buddy, making sure they're safe and able to farm at will. If the enemy manages to slow or stun his ally, Tahm Kench simply s them before heading to safety. The effect lasts longer than most crowd control abilities, so even if the enemy team manages to land a perfect catch on the River King's marksman, Tahm Kench effectively cleanses it before repositioning somewhere safer. What's more, should he end up on the receiving end of enemy attacks as he waddles away, 's passive offers the River King plenty of regenerative support. Finally, even if the enemy team commits to trading in lane, Tahm Kench can turn his attention to the enemy damage dealer, slathering them up with his before ing them to create a super powerful - albeit temporary - two vs one scenario. His versatility really shines in ganks, too. Aside from offering his ally the same unmatched protection during enemy ganks, he can get pretty mouthy in allied ganks, too. Meandering out of lane under the pretense of warding, Tahm Kench can meet up with his jungler before using to set up a gank. ;Solo Lane Tahm Kench is tanky enough to take a licking as well as one, so he's best positioned amongst his minions when he heads to a solo lane. From there the River King's free to last hit and trade with his opponent as he sees fit. The thing to remember with Tahm Kench is that even when he goes even in trades, he wins thanks to 's passive, which regenerates enough of the River King's health to make otherwise questionable trades more palatable. If it looks like the enemy's trying to all-in him, Tahm Kench can his enemy for a burst of damage and some uninhibited healing, or, if he hasn't applied enough stacks of his , activate for a life-saving shield. But how does the velvet-voiced monstrosity actually fight? Well, most of his early poke and harass comes from . Fishing for direct hits on enemy champions, or better still, pulling off the , should give Tahm Kench the edge in most of his tank battles. But once he's fully applied to his snakebit target, he has far more tricks to show them than a measly stun. is a deeply versatile ability that gives the River King options aplenty, even during the early stages of the game. He can down on his lane opponent as they push up to the tower, then, with clever timing, them out behind his tower just as it obliterates the last of the minions. Better still, Tahm Kench can his enemy as his jungler comes in for a gank. His hapless victim won't see their approaching death thanks to the greatly reduced vision they suffer from while inside, and once they back out of the monster's maw, they'll struggle to do anything other than... well, die. ;Skirmishing Even as early as level six, Tahm Kench can start freely roaming, using to quite literally dive behind unsuspecting enemies. Thanks to his expansive gut, also gives the River King the option to bring the party with him as he around. He can, for instance, buddy up with his nearby jungler and over to mid, setting up a quick three versus one scenario. Even if their target to their tower, Tahm Kench can lead the tower diving incursion, using to absorb the tower's shots while his allies secure the kill. These tactics have legs around neutral objectives, too. By with his own jungler, Tahm Kench can quickly reposition to or to stall or steal the enemy team's kill. Once they arrive, the River King's role is to annoy his enemies with while keeping at hand if his allies get dangerously low. plays its part here, shielding Tahm Kench's muculent form from excessive heat should he draw it. When the time comes, all he has to do is the enemy jungler and lurch away from the objective - even though they can still theoretically inside the River King's belly, junglers can't ever the things they can't see. ;Teamfights Tahm Kench becomes quite the champion connoisseur as the two teams come together, with a role that revolves around one fundamental culinary question: who does he ? As the fight starts breaking out, he needs to carefully watch as the health bars begin dropping, smacking approaching enemy damage-dealers with to slow or, if he's been busy with his , stun them. Positioning's key here, too: if he situates himself in the enemy team, Tahm Kench is perfectly placed to disrupt and otherwise annoy the enemy team's most powerful champions. Using 's shield to absorb damage should keep the River King ticking for long enough to fully stack , after which he can . Pulling a powerful enemy out of a closely-contested fight, even for a few seconds, will often completely turn the tide, allowing Tahm Kench's allies to take down - or mop up - the enemy team before the loquacious amphibian out the final vestige of the enemy team. It's not pretty, but it's pretty damn effective. Alternatively, Tahm Kench can stick to his backline and peel for his allies while aiming his instincts closer to home. 's slow will buy his backline seconds against approaching killers, but if even that fails, Tahm Kench still has a trick up his sleeve... scales... whatever. See, once most marksman get caught by the enemy team, it's curtains for them, but not with the River King on their team. By sidling up and ing his ailing ally, Tahm Kench can quickly reposition and them somewhere safer. Immediately back in the fight - and with the enemy assassins and fighters rid of their precious gap closers - Tahm Kench and his ally should be safely squared away to wreak havoc from afar. ;Synergy Champion Insights: Tahm Kench, the River King By fizzNchips Champion Insights: Tahm Kench, the River King We sat down with the champion ideation team to hear about the process that took an idea - Fish Tank - and turned it into . ;Game design notes : by ZenonTheStoic As a role, tanks have generally brought one of two things to their team: either they're in the / camp of locking down an entire enemy team and setting up for a wombo combo, or they help their team lock down and eliminate a single high value enemy target either through chained CC (think into into on ) or by throwing/dragging the enemy into the tank's team ( , , ) The challenge we wanted to tackle with Tahm Kench was to take a tank who did neither of these, and instead offered something completely different to his team. The art guys got scribbling, and soon started gravitating towards this Big Mouth character. This was a huge boost for us, with the visuals quickly inspiring a mechanic that was relevant to the champion's visuals and new to League, too: . Let's start with devouring allies. We knew we wanted the ability to work on enemies, and we were initially pretty hesitant about allowing Tahm Kench to eat his pals. That said, once we tried it out, we realized that 'Tahm Kench the Armored Personnel Carrier' was actually pretty fun. Aside from the risk of trolling, allies will quickly realize how good it feels when a decent Tahm player has their back. He can you over a wall, you over a wall, and run fast toward the enemy if you're a type looking for a free ride to your soon-to-be victims. As the ally, you can also decide when and where Tahm spits you, after a short lockout period. What's more, being able to pull an ally out of a fight at will is really strong. It can save allies from abilities like or , and generally allows squishies to do Really Dumb Things and get away with it. This should enable riskier plays, particularly from the kind of high damage/low health champs that usually have to pull away from a scrap, or at least fight from the back. "But Zenon, how is that fair? I just spent all my CC on this guy, we were about to kill him, and then suddenly General Gulp comes in and whisks him away!" Well yes, imaginary FAQ person, but let me tell you about a few things I added in to help balance things a little. First of all, as I mentioned, while Tahm Kench has this pretty swell devour ability, he lacks a lot of the traditional tools that tanks usually carry around. He can't lock down enemies at will, for instance, and he has absolutely no utility AoE tools that your average punching bag brings to a fight. Secondly, while eating an ally to keep them safe is super clutch, the ability does come with some baked in drawbacks. Its relatively short range means Tahm, who most of the time will be on a support budget and thus not the tankiest man in the game, will have to stand close to your team, or at least close to members of his team who you want to kill. So uh... you can just kill him if you focus him. Lastly, if Tahm Kench does eat his ally, the ability's minimum duration means you'll still have a few precious seconds to leverage your temporary numbers advantage! "Okay. Tell me about enemy devour." As a raw mechanic - taking enemies out of a fight and severely reducing their vision for a few seconds - enemy is incredibly powerful, which forced us to consider the circumstances through which it would be okay to use, even for a few seconds. We knew that Tahm Kench couldn't just go around eating enemy champs at will - that would be ridiculous - so we started figuring out ways to backload the ability, or establish X criteria that you need to meet before Y can happen. For comparison, can into a teamfight at will because is a frontloaded ability - it has immediate impact and once it's spent, he has to wait a long while before he can use it again. Because we had decided he would bring the usual tank toolset of locking down an enemy, we couldn't allow Tahm Kench the same flexibility, so ended up implementing stacks into his kit. So, while Tahm Kench can eat enemy champions and take them out of a fight for a few seconds, he has to hit them with a few basic attacks (or licks) first. This takes time and proximity, and telegraphs his intentions to the enemy team, giving them plenty of time to peel for the River King's target. While the rest of his kit certainly adds to his uniqueness ( , an idea we borrowed from fighting games, is also new to League, while his is a really strong flanking tool that reinforces his Armored Personnel Carrier-ness) it was his that really set Tahm Kench apart from the rest. Hopefully you'll be able to make the most of the ability and wreak your own different brand of havoc with the verbose villain. ;Art notes : by Chris Campbell aka Skeeziks and Gem Lim aka Lonewingy ;The Ideation Process Media Music= |-|Videos= ;Related Videos Worlds 2016 Zedd - Ignite| |-|Gallery= Tahm concept 13.jpg|Tahm Kench Concept 1 (by Riot Artist Gem 'Lonewingy' Lim) Tahm concept 14.jpg|Tahm Kench Concept 2 (by Riot Artist Gem 'Lonewingy' Lim) Tahm model 1.jpg|Tahm Kench Model (by Riot Artist Willem 'Tokkelossie' Van Der Schyf) Tahm Kench MasterChef concept.jpg|Master Chef Tahm Kench Concept (by Riot Artist Sunny Koda) Tahm Kench Krugettes.jpg|Master Chef Tahm Kench Krugettes Recipe (by Riot Artist (by Riot Artist Kienan 'Knockwurst' Lafferty) Tahm Kench Kalista Kebabs.jpg|Master Chef Tahm Kench Kalista Kebabs Recipe (by Riot Artist (by Riot Artist Kienan 'Knockwurst' Lafferty) Tahm Kench Amumoodles.jpg|Master Chef Tahm Kench Amumoodles Recipe (by Riot Artist Kienan 'Knockwurst' Lafferty) Category:Champion development Category:Tahm Kench